Sylvia Pennington

iPhone, Android or Windows? For most Australian buyers it's a toss-up between the first two options but Microsoft Australia managing director Pip Marlow is hoping a strong sales push on the vendor's new Nokia Lumia range will make it a three horse race.

Since acquiring Nokia in 2013, Microsoft has begun pushing its offerings as an alternative at the top and bottom of the mature and hotly contested local smartphone market, with the aim of upping its share from six to 10 per cent.

It launched three new models at the IFA consumer electronics show in Berlin overnight, including the Nokia Lumia 830 pitched as "affordable" at an European price tag of $457 and the Lumia 730, a "selfie phone".

Accustomed to more than two decades of Goliath status in the software and services sector, Ms Marlow said the company faced a tough battle to entice consumers and business users to change their allegiances.

In Australia, Android and iOS mobiles enjoy 66.5 per cent and 27 per cent market share respectively, according to ComTech's July 2014 statistics, while Windows Phone account for just 5.7 per cent.

Speaking to Fairfax Media's IT Pro at the annual Microsoft Australian Partner Conference on the Gold Coast this week, Ms Marlow said winning hearts and minds would be a gradual process.

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"With the Nokia acquisition, we're a challenger in that space and we're going to have to make that market," she said.

"If we continue in Australia to inch up bit by bit, if we can get to be [ten] per cent of the market, that's a tipping point."

Mobile market watcher Foad Fadaghi, managing director of Telsyte, believes it's a goal that will be possible but difficult to achieve.

The number of customers intending to make a repeat purchase of a Windows Phone fell below 50 per cent last year, compared with Android's 62 per cent and Apple's 70 per cent, according to Fadaghi.

"Telsyte research shows that of those that intend to purchase a Windows Phone in the second half of 2014, most are existing Nokia users or are currently on a feature phone," he said.

Australian data centres

Herding corporate and government customers into the public cloud is likely to be a significantly easier sales proposition for Microsoft, as it prepares to open the doors of Azure data centres in Sydney and Melbourne before year's end.

Azure is Microsoft's platform for building and deploying cloud based applications.

The Australian centres will also service the New Zealand market and other neighbouring countries.

They are being put through their paces by local developers Janison Solutions and Ocean Informatics, a supplier of e-health services including a shared electronic health record for rural indigenous Australians.

Ms Marlow said Azure customer numbers had tripled in the past year and predicted a further surge in demand when access to the local centres was available to all comers.

"Opening in country will continue that momentum. We will open the doors for all…there is so much banging on that door."

International technology vendors have come under the spotlight in recent times for failing to pay their fair share of tax in jurisdictions such as Australia where they chalk up billions in annual revenue.

Google has been singled out for particular attention; with the revelation earlier this year that its tax bill had risen ten-fold to $7.1 million; a fraction of what it earns from its search business, which bills business customers in Singapore.

Ms Marlow said Microsoft had always complied with the tax regime "in all jurisdictions in which we operate".

"We should, like every company, adhere to these laws."

In the market for a new smartphone? Would you consider switching to a Windows phone? Share your opinion in the comments.

The Brisbane-based writer attended the conference as a guest of the Microsoft.